The Guadalupe County Attorney this week dismissed felony cases against five defendants after evidence in each of the criminal matters was improperly destroyed by the Schertz Police Department, court records obtained by KSAT Investigates show.

Schertz police said more than 1,000 cases were impacted in the purge of the department’s property room that led to evidence being destroyed or removed.

Over a decade worth of evidence was destroyed or removed from the Schertz Police Department’s property room without prosecutorial review, according to a cease and desist letter obtained by the KSAT 12 Defenders.

In a text message sent to Willborn Martinez wrote that he felt horrible about the mistake. “I promise you that’s not the normal,” wrote Martinez, according to internal affairs records. Ad“In my professional experience, this is not an uncommon practice for officers preparing a search warrant by including some paragraphs or statements recycled from a previous warrant,” wrote Schertz Police Captain Manny Casas. Like anything else, if proper proofreading protocols are not followed, unfortunate errors may occur,” wrote Schertz Director of Public Affairs Linda Klepper. Likening the execution of a search warrant to a press release insults citizens’ intelligence.